Russia
Russia (or Russian Federation) is a transcontinental country existing in Europe and Asia. It is one of the permanent five member of the United Nations Security Council. Russia is generally regarded as the successor state to the Soviet Union, which was dissolved in 1991. With the fall of the U.S.S.R. the country stopped being a world superpower, and today Russia is either weak or not very important in many aspects, such as economical, political, and military power; compared to the former Soviet Union.Russia and the Soviet Union. Oracle ThinkQuest History Pre-imperial Russia Some of the first inhabitants of Russia were nomadic people of the steppes, who migrated there thousands of years ago. The first powerful Russian state was Kievan Rus', which was founded by Vikings in the 9th century. By the 13th century, Kievan Rus' had been succeeded by the Grand Duchy of Moscow in Russia. In 1547, the Grand Duchy of Moscow formed the Tsardom of Russia, with Ivan IV as its first Tsar, or Emperor. By the late 1600s Russia was one of Europe's great powers. Imperial Russia In 1721, the Tsardom of Russia became the Russian Empire under Peter the Great. In 1861, serfdom was abolished, but this did not end dissent in the empire. When Tsar Nicholas II took the reins in 1894, the Russian Empire was doomed. At the beginning of World War I, the Russian army suffered massive defeats from the German Empire and in 1917 a communist revolution ended its participation in the war. The revolution led to the establishment of the Soviet Union, the first socialist state in the world. Soviet Russia After defeating Nazi Germany in World War II, the Soviet Union became one of the world's two superpowers, with the United States. The two nations then entered a period of proxy wars and threat of nuclear war dubbed the Cold War, which partly resulted from the invention of nuclear weapons. ]] In 1957 the Soviet Union launched the world's first artificial satellite, Sputnik 1, thus starting the Space Age. Russian cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin became the first human to orbit the Earth aboard Vostok 1 manned spacecraft on 12 April 1961. In the 1980s, the Soviet Union under Mikhail Gorbachev began gradual economic and political reforms that led to its dissolution in 1991, with Russia as its prime successor state. Post-Soviet Russia During and after the Soviet disintegration, wide-ranging reforms including privatisation and market and trade liberalization were being undertaken,"Russian Federation". Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). including the radical changes along the lines of "shock therapy" as recommended by the United States and International Monetary Fund. All this resulted in a major economy crisis, characterized by 50% decline of both GDP and industrial output between 1990-95. The privatization largely shifted control of enterprises from state agencies to individuals with inside connections in the government system. Many of the newly rich businesspeople took billions in cash and assets outside of the country in an enormous capital flight. The depression of state and economy led to the collapse of social services; the birth rate plummeted while the death rate skyrocketed. Millions plunged into poverty, from 1.5% level of poverty in the late Soviet era, to 39–49% by mid-1993. The 1990s saw extreme corruption and lawlessness, rise of criminal gangs and violent crime. Political-economy analysis of the transition to capitalism The establishment of capitalism in the former socialist states of Eastern Europe entailed a change in the social form of those societies' physical resources: a change from state, and in theory at least, communal, control, to private control – in other wordes, their conversion into capital. The process has been likened to the enclosure of the commons which was part of the primitive (original or initial) accumulation of capital described by Karl Marx in Capital, Volume I. The Hungarian sociologist Iván Szelényi compares the Russian oligarchs who were authorized by president Boris Yeltsin in the 1990s to the robber barons such as John Rockefeller, Jay Gould, and Andrew Carnegie who comprised the American grand bourgeoisie which arose rapidly between 1860 and 1890. In a November-December 2015 New Left Review article entitled "Capitalisms after Communism" Ivan describes the aggressive way in which the robber barons "swallowed state subsidies" and used underhanded techniques to build their empires and drive their competitors from the market. However, in the Russian case he says that the capital accumulation process was even more stark and abrupt because in the American case, as well as in the earlier accumulation described by Karl Marx, some private ownership of resources already existed before the transition to full capitalism; whereas, in the Russian case private ownership went from near zero to a relatively high level almost overnight. Iván notes that Boris Yeltsin's stated goal `was to "build" capitalism in 500 days, in a country where there had been no private capital accumulation' (p 45). In Russia, the process consisted mainly in Boris Yeltsin and others with political power bestowing the former Soviet state's resources on candidates who were talented but also, importantly, likely to remain loyal to them. The situation had some similarity to the granting of fiefs by a feudal lord. According to Iván, the property rights of the new capitalists were quite secure under Boris Yeltsin, who asked only that they should stand behind him in times of crisis. Iván cites the 1996 election as one occasion in which this deal was consummated: "Indeed, the 1996 presidential elections showed this from the oligarchs was a reasonable expectation. His popularity was at an all time low and he faced a formidable challenger, the communist Zyuganov. Russia's seven biggest businessmen – just five years after the collapse of the USSR, they claimed they owned half the country – lined up behind him and put their media at his disposal; with the help of Clinton'sU.S. president Bill. political advertising professionals, this assured his re-election" (p 45). By the end of the 1990s, though, the oligarchs were asserting more independence, behaving "like boyars, exploiting the weaknesses of the central power and even nursing political ambitions for themselves" (p 46). This process was reversed by Vladimir Putin who came to power in 2000. Since a large proportion of the former Soviet state's resoueces had already been handed out by this time, Vladimir Putin "did not have the resources to recruit his own loyal propertied class." His solution was to attack the oligarchs, so that he could seize and redistribute part of their assets to his own supporters. This also reduced the power of the oligarchs to contest with him politically. Politics According to the Constitution of Russia, the country is a federation and semi-presidential republic, wherein the President is the head of state and the Prime Minister is the head of government. The Russian Federation is fundamentally structured as a bourgeoisie democracy, with the federal government composed of three branches: * Legislative: The bicameral Federal Assembly, made up of the State Duma and the Federation Council. * Executive: The President of Russia. * Judiciary: The Constitutional Court, Supreme Court, Supreme Court of Arbitration and lower federal courts. Leading political parties in Russia include United Russia, the Communist Party, the Liberal Democratic Party of Russia, and Fair Russia. Socialist movements The Communist Party of the Russian Federation is the second largest political party in Russia, and it is growing as a political movement. However, some characterize the dominating Zyuganov wing as nationalistEthnic Nationalism in the Russian Federation by Anatoly M. Khazanov; Daedalus, Vol. 126, 1997 or 'popular-patriotic' (which is often used by the party militants themselves), rather than orthodox Marxist-Leninist. Some observers consider only Richard Kosolapov's minority faction of the CPRF as ideologically communist per se. Foreign relations .]] The Russian Federation is recognized as successor state of the former Soviet Union. Russia continues to implement the international commitments of the USSR, and has assumed the USSR's permanent seat in the UN Security Council, membership in other international organisations, the rights and obligations under international treaties, and property and debts. Russia usually takes a leading role in regional organisations such as the CIS, EurAsEC, CSTO, and the SCO.The Shanghai Cooperation Organisation at Globalsecurity.org 27 April 2005 Since the dissolution of the Soviet Union, Russia has developed a friendlier, albeit volatile relationship with NATO. Russia maintains strong and positive relations with other BRIC countries. Military .]] The Russian military is divided into the Ground Forces, Navy, and Air Force. In 2006, the military had 1.037 million personnel on active duty. Russia has the largest stockpile of nuclear weapons in the world. It has the second largest fleet of ballistic missile submarines and is the only country apart from the U.S. with a modern strategic bomber force. Russia pilots proud of flights to foreign shores by David Nowak. The Associated Press, 15 Sep 2008 Russia's tank force is the largest in the world, its surface navy and air force are among the largest ones. Geography Russia is the largest country in the world at 17,075,400 square kilometers (6,592,800 square miles). Also, extending for 57,792 kilometers, the Russian border is the world's longest. Russia shares borders with Norway, Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Poland (both via Kaliningrad Oblast), Belarus, Ukraine, Georgia, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, the People's Republic of China, Mongolia, and North Korea. From north to south the East European Plain is clad sequentially in tundra, coniferous forest, mixed and broad-leaf forests, grassland (steppe), and semi-desert (fringing the Caspian Sea) as the changes in vegetation reflect the changes in climate. Siberia supports a similar sequence but is taiga. Russia is a water-rich country. The most prominent of Russia's bodies of fresh water is Lake Baikal, the world's deepest and most capacious freshwater lake. Lake Baikal alone holds 85% of the freshwater resources of the lakes in Russia and 20% of the world's total. Numerous smaller lakes dot the northern regions of the European and Siberian plains. Economy Since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, Russia has tried to develop a market economy and achieve consistent economic growth. In October 1991, Yeltsin announced that Russia would proceed with radical, market-oriented reform along the lines of "shock therapy", as recommended by the United States and IMF. However, this policy resulted in economic collapse, with millions being plunged into poverty and corruption and crime spreading rapidly. Hyperinflation resulted from the removal of Soviet price controls and again following the 1998 Russian financial crisis. When once all enterprises belonged to the state and were supposed to be equally owned amongst all citizens, they fell into the hands of a few, who became immensely rich. Stocks of the state-owned enterprises were issued, and these new publicly traded companies were quickly handed to the members of Nomenklatura or known criminal bosses. For example, the director of a factory during the Soviet regime would often become the owner of the same enterprise. During the same period, violent criminal groups often took over state enterprises, clearing the way by assassinations or extortion. Corruption of government officials became an everyday rule of life. Under the government's cover, outrageous financial manipulations were performed that enriched the narrow group of individuals at key positions of the business and government mafia. The largest state enterprises were controversially privatized by President Boris Yeltsin to insiders for far less than they were worth. Many Russians consider these infamous "oligarchs" to be thieves. Through their immense wealth, the oligarchs wielded significant political influence. Recovery As of 2009 real GDP increased by the highest percentage since the fall of the Soviet Union at 8.1%, the ruble remains stable, inflation has been moderate, and investment began to increase again. The FY 2002 Russian Government budget assumes payment of roughly $14 billion in official debt service payments falling due. Large current account surpluses have brought a rapid appreciation of the ruble over the past several years. This has meant that Russia has given back much of the terms-of-trade advantage that it gained when the ruble fell by 60% during the debt crisis. Oil and gas dominate Russian exports, so Russia remains highly dependent upon the price of energy. Loan and deposit rates at or below the inflation rate inhibit the growth of the banking system and make the allocation of capital and risk much less efficient than it would be otherwise. In 2003, the debt has risen to $19 billion due to higher Ministry of Finance and Eurobond payments. However, $1 billion of this has been prepaid, and some of the private sector debt may already have been repurchased. Russia continues to explore debt swap/exchange opportunities. The Russian economy is still commodity-driven despite its growth. Payments from the fuel and energy sector in the form of customs duties and taxes accounted for nearly half of the federal budget's revenues. The large majority of Russia's exports are made up by raw materials and fertilizers, although exports as a whole accounted for only 8.7% of the GDP in 2007, compared to 20% in 2000.Rosstat Confirms Record GDP Growth Kommersant. Retrieved on 5 May 2008 There is also a growing gap between rich and poor in Russia. Between 2000–2007 the incomes of the rich grew from approximately 14 times to 17 times larger than the incomes of the poor. Moscow now boasts the highest billionaire population, ahead of New York City. This is a clear sign of economic inequality. In adddition, a shrinking and aging population, corruption, and deficient infrastructure pose as serious challenges for the Russian economy. Demographics 79% of the population of Russia consists of ethnic Russians. The other 21% is made up of over 160 different ethnic groups, including Tatars, Chechens, and native Siberians. Language The primary language of Russia is Russian. Other minority languages include Tatar and Ukrainian. Religion Most of Russians belong to the Russian Orthodox Church. Atheism and Judaism also have influence in Russia. References Category:Russia Category:Central Asian countries Category:East Asian countries Category:Southwest Asian countries Category:European countries Category:Bicontinental countries Category:Countries that have laws against Nazism